WIND BOY: An Exploratory Design of a Wind Driven Modular Facade

Abstract

For centuries, men have been using the wind, which is a healthy and renewable resource, to improve the thermal comfort inside their structures. This traditional cooling system that have been providing relief from daytime heat are usually based on the presence of chimneys (cooling towers), courtyards, water sprays or associated with natural air movement. However, these strategies are usually dependent on building design and can sometimes be difficult to transport from one application to another. This study is an exploratory design of a new and innovative method for cooling buildings by a simple wind induced façade, which I called the Wind Boy. The term ―Wind Boy‖ is my homage to a young African boy who, after a terrible drought struck his village, was able to provide electricity to his Malawian village by harnessing the power of the wind. A wind driven ventilation façade system that utilize wind as a natural energy to provide improved air quality inside the buildings is thus been explored in this paper. Subsequently, numerical analysis using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) was also employed to investigate internal flows inside a space using the proposed Wind Boy. Finally, the model will be analysed to determine if the façade configuration will provide better thermal comfort. The resulting study will benefit in the formulation of guidelines for the design of a sustainable building façade in the future.